Ayman Mohyeldin

At 45 years old, Ayman Mohyeldin has this physical status:

Ayman Mohyeldin (born April 18, 1979) is an American journalist based in Los Angeles for NBC News.

He previously worked for Al Jazeera and CNN.

Ayman was one of the first Western journalists allowed to enter and report on the handing over and trial of the deposed President of Iraq Saddam Hussein by the Iraqi Interim Government for crimes against humanity.

Ayman has also covered the 2008–09 Gaza War as well as the Arab Spring.

Early life

Mohyeldin was born in Cairo, Egypt, to an Egyptian father, Medhat Mohyeldin, and a Palestinian mother, Abla Awwad. His father is a certified public accountant in Marietta, Georgia. Mohyeldin has an older brother, Ahmed, who is a resident neurosurgeon at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center and former professional soccer star for the Atlanta Silverbacks. Mohyeldin lived in Egypt until the age of 5 when his parents emigrated to the U.S. He attended North Cobb High School in Kennesaw, Georgia.

Mohyeldin received his undergraduate education at American University in Washington D.C., earning a BA in International Relations with a focus on the European Union. He received an MA in International Politics with a focus on Peace and Conflict Resolution. His graduate thesis was entitled, "The News Media Paradigm in the War on Terrorism," and, in 2002, it was accepted by the International Association of Media Researchers Conference in Barcelona, Spain. He lived in Iraq from 2003–2005 as a foreign news producer with CNN.

Personal life

Mohyeldin married Tunisian model Kenza Fourati on April 26, 2016 in a private ceremony in Marietta, Georgia, where his parents currently reside.

His wife revealed in a Vogue Arabia interview that the couple was expecting their first child in early 2017. Their daughter, Dora Fourati Mohyeldin, was born in New York on March 12, 2017. The couple welcomed their second child, Idris, a son, in 2019.

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Career

As a desk assistant for the Washington, D.C. bureau, Mohyeldin began his career in journalism at NBC. Mohyeldin's first big assignments came shortly after 9/11. In an interview with PRWeek, he discusses the opportunities that arose in the aftermath of 9/11: "There was a real shortage of people with language skills or expertise in the Middle East." I had a lot of experience when I figured out how to speak and the timing. I was introduced to a slew of things that most desk assistants at my level would not have gotten. I started working on several important pieces that had to do with investigating 9/11 and all kinds of international terrorist links... I was mostly translating, but I was also designing themes or threads to stories that either had a Middle East connection or some sort of Arabic language skills. "It's an amazing experience at a very young age."

The Iraq War, the first multi-candidate presidential Egyptian elections in 2005, Israel's withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, and the 2005 Palestinian elections in Gaza are among Mohyeldin's coverage of major news events in the Arab World and Middle East. He has covered the Sharm al-Sheikh resort bombings (July 2005) and the Jordan Hotel bombings (November 2005).

Mohyeldin, a writer, became the first journalist to enter one of Libya's nuclear research centers after preparing Col. Muammar al-Gaddafi's first interview, announcing that Libya will no longer have WMD programs. An Emmy Award was given to Mohyeldin's role in CNN's "Iraq:progress report" chronicing Iraqis' daily struggles during the war. He served as an associate producer on the NBC News Special "Ship at War: Inside the Carrier Stennis" and "Inside the Real West Wing" during Emmy nominations. Mohyeldin has also covered the annual Muslim pilgrimage (Hajj) to Mecca and was instrumental in the development of CNN specials "Islam: The Struggle Within" and "Hajj: A Spiritual Journey" from CNN.

Mohyeldin covered Gaza's Israeli attack in 2008-2009. In the documentary "The War Around Us," he and Sherine Tadros have reported on their coverage. He detailed the intricate network of tunnels that were once used for smuggling arms and people across the Egyptian-Gaza border and are now a vital route into Gaza for medicine, food, and fuel delivery.

Mohyeldin left Al Jazeera English and returned to NBC in 2011, where he largely covered Egypt's second "Arab Uprising" in 2013. He also covered the unrest in Ukraine and Iraq's uprising.

The 2011 Egyptian Revolution for Al Jazeera English was covered by Mohyeldin. He broadcast live from the Al Jazeera news building in Cairo for many hours straight, covering Egyptian protests as demonstrators and Egyptian police clashed for control of the Egyptian bridge. Anis El Fekki of the Egyptian Interior Ministry reactivated Al Jazeera's radio license on January 30 and ordered the closure of their Cairo bureau, saying the network was conspiring with opposition parties to overthrowrown the government. He was one of five Al Jazeera journalists arrested and briefly detained by Egyptian authorities the following day, after the network refused to stop broadcasting due to the loss of their accreditation.

The Egyptian military detained Mohyeldin again on February 6, 2011, trying to reach Tahr square. He was released nine hours later.

Mohyeldin's career began on September 20, 2011 and he returned to NBC News.

Mohyeldin travelled to Syria in January 2012 to cover the months-old revolt. Daraa was one of the cities he visited among the cities he visited.

President Mohamed Morsi was deposed from office in Egypt during the summer of 2013. During the Syrian civil war and the consequences of refugees' flow into neighboring Lebanon, he also wrote a lengthy report. Mohyeldin also addressed Syria's decision to abandon its chemical program.

Mohyeldin spent time in both Kiev and Donetsk during the 2014 Ukrainian uprisings. He travelled to Eastern Ukraine to report on Russian troop buildup and Ukrainian reaction. To report, he went "behind the scenes" into the occupied government buildings.

At the start of the one-month-long 2014 war, Mohyeldin was sent by NBC as a reporter to Gaza. Media commentators such as Glenn Greenwald praised his coverage for stepping away from "the usual pro-Israel coverage that dominates establishment American media coverage."

The death of four Palestinian children who were playing soccer and hide-and-seek on a Gaza beach was confirmed by two weeks into the war, as shown by a series of tweets on July 16, 2014. One child was killed in the first missile, and the other three killed the other three. Many in the international press reported the killings. These boys were kicking a soccer ball in front of his hotel just moments before. The Israeli government said the beach was shelled in reaction to the Hamas rocket fire suspected of originating from the region, but journalists who attended the beach said the beach was empty except for a fisherman's hut and a few tools.

Despite the fact that Mohyeldin was a live witness to the tragedy, NBC reporter Richard Engel chronicled the incident in Tel Aviv. Following NBC's withdrawal of Mohyeldin from Gaza and halting his reporting duties from Gaza indefinitely, he retired. Engel was sent to Gaza to substitute him. Independent media outlets chastised NBC for removing Mohyeldin, with some believing he was singled out for depicting Palestinians with compassion and denying NBC of pro-Israel bias.

After NBC received a lot of flak over him being evacuated from Gaza, Mohyeldin was returned to Gaza on July 18, 2014. Israel and Hamas announced a ceasefire on Sunday, August 3, 2014, after four weeks on the road.

During live coverage of a story in October 2015, Mohyeldin was accused of inaccurate reporting and bias. A Palestinian man wearing camouflaged clothing sprang out from a group of Israeli soldiers wielding a knife and being fired. Mohyeldin first claimed during a live MSNBC broadcast that he did not see a knife in the man's open hands until he saw the corpse. However, he was interrupted on air by José D'Az-Balart, who was on the radio with a snapshot of the assassin holding what seemed to be a knife in the air before he was killed. Following Mohyeldin's interruption, the assassination of the MSNBC journalist didn't have a knife in his hands until he was dead and seized by the Israeli police.

Following his coverage of the Tel Aviv shooting in June 2016, The Jerusalem Post, an Israeli newspaper, chastised Mohyeldin for his "rambling, 35 second stream of consciousness in which he managed to squeeze in four mentions of 'the occupation' and three mentions of Israeli politics' "shifting to the right' or the 'extreme right,' while discussing Palestinian "frustration' and Israeli oppression.

Since joining NBC News in 2011, Mohyeldin has hosted a variety of shows, including First Look, an early-morning show, and Ayman Mohyeldin Reports (originally MSNBC Live with Ayman Mohyeldin), a weekday afternoon show. In September 2021, his program Ayman took over the weekend evening slot formerly held by Joshua Johnson's The Week with Joshua Johnson, which also broadcasts on Peacock, while Hallie Jackson took over his weekday afternoon slot. Chris Hayes, a fill-in host on MSNBC's All In with Chris Hayes, Deadline: White House, The Beat with Ari Melber, and The Rachel Maddow Show.

Mohyeldin received a call from a high school classmate in Kennesaw, Georgia, whose sister-in-law Rosanne Boyland was killed in the attack shortly after the 2021 United States Capitol attack. Including how Boyland died and how "a newly apolitical 34-year-old homebody [was] so revolutionary in the summer of 2020] that resulted in a five-part podcast named American Radical, which premiered in December 2021.

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